Remembering composer playback singer and music director Shiv Dayal Batish 1914-2006

Shiv Dayal Batish (better known as S.D. Batish; 14 December 1914 – 29 July 2006) was an Indian singer and music director born in Patiala, India to a Brahmin family. He died in Santa Cruz, California, USA where he had lived since 1970.

Career
Shiv was a composer, playback singer and music director for Bollywood music. He broadcast his first radio program in 1936, from the studios of All India Radio, Delhi. He has scored music for a number of early Bollywood movies such as Betab, Bahu Beti, Toofan, Harjeet, Tipu Sultan, Ham Bhi Kuch Kam Nahin, Amar Keertan, and Zalim Tera Jawab Naheen.

Shiv moved to the United Kingdom in 1964. While playing at a festival in Wales, Cardiff, he impressed Lord Fenner Brockway, who then helped him immigrate to the UK.

He recorded a number of songs for the BBC where he became a regular radio and television artist. He wrote the words, composed the music, and sang the theme song "Nai Zindagi Naya Jivan" ("New Birth, New Life") to the BBC television show Apna Hi Ghar Samajhiye ("Make Yourself at Home"), a cornerstone of early South Asian programming. He had the honor of being the first musician featured when the Asian programs in Britain started back in 1965

In early 1965, Batish played vichitra veena on the incidental music used in the Beatles' feature film Help!  Batish subsequently gave dilruba lessons to Pattie Boyd, the wife of Beatles guitarist George Harrison, whose dedication to Indian classical music had helped popularise the genre in the West during the mid 1960s.